Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 175, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 August 1917 — SQUEEZE PLAY TRIED [ARTICLE]

SQUEEZE PLAY TRIED

Yankees and Red Sox Used It to Good Advantage. ~ ■ *- > 'Tough Job to Stop Maneuver If Player at Bat Is Capable Bunter—No Defense Against It If Batter j Taps Ball on Ground. - The New York Americans have used the squeeze play with good success this season, and so have the Boston Red Sox. It is a tough job to stop this play if the man at bat is a capable bunter. Unless the pitcher or catcher can foretell that the play is to be attempted there is practically no defense against it if the batter taps the ball anywhere on the ground. McGraw does not like the play and rarely uses it. If the catcher calls for a pitch out he can of course make the man coming in look bad. He is caught half way down the base line and is an easy victim. McGraw figures if the play goes-Wrong he sacrifices a man at third, who might be brought in with a hit or sacrifice fly. The Yanks, however, met their big success with it by the daring way they ( used it, especially against Johnson. They practically beat Johnson in two games by this play. Johnson is not the easiest man to bunt against, but with all his speed he could not check the play even when it was right in front of him. In a ten-inning game with the bases full in the tenth inning, Malsel bunted the first ball direct to Johnson. Walter did not have to move a step for it, and fielded it as quickly as could be possible. But by the time he got the ball the short distance home, Miller, who had started home with his wind-up, j was over the plate. This individual play shbws how effective this play is against perfect defense. Both the Athletic champions of 1910, 1911, 1913 and 1914, and the Red Sox world’s champions of the last two years, have foundlhls play quite a useful one with which to win close games, but no team ever used it as consistently as the Yankees in the last week. Donovan called for it almost every time he got a man on third, and the pretty part of It was that it always worked.